


Motherly Mirage And Mirrors

by XtaticPearl



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Angst, Broken Families, Emotional Manipulation, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Parent-Child Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-05
Updated: 2017-11-05
Packaged: 2019-01-29 21:11:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12639270
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/XtaticPearl/pseuds/XtaticPearl
Summary: Tony watched with a growing horror and freezing veins as Natasha morphed into a familiar figure. A figure that haunted his memories and burnt like yesterday’s touch. Bile churned in his gut but Tony couldn’t look away from the biggest nightmare of his life.





	Motherly Mirage And Mirrors

Tony watched with a poker face and clenched hands as Natasha smirked from the high table, no sign of green now but the glint of coldness clear in her eyes.

 

“You won’t be able to pull this off. The others will hunt you down soon and then you’ll pay for this,” Steve, _Commander_ Rogers, declared even as he knelt a few feet away from where Tony stood, kept low by power dampening restraints. He looked calm from the distance, ever the tactician, but Tony knew that he was a ticking bomb. Steve was always a ticking bomb and this, this was going to be a dangerous catalyst. Natasha had always been Steve’s friend and to find out that she was a Skrull, the _Queen_ of Skrulls, it would turn their entire history on its tail.

 

“Such temper, Steve,” Natasha, _Veranke_ , tutted as she ran a finger over the polished table that had Tony’s nameplate with the Director’s designation, “And to think that I had trained you out of your tells by now.”

 

“You wanna play the Mocking Game with a guy who wears spandex like second skin?” Tony quipped, trying to divert attention from Steve, “How about you tell us your great evil plan now that we _are_ in the monologue game? It’ll probably more interesting that this one.”

 

Veranke looked at Tony and her gaze turned pitying, like a predator would a dying prey.

 

“Oh, but Tony,” the Skrull queen tilted her head slightly with a patronizing smile, “what’s the fun of winning without playing a game? It’s such a dull affair to end it with a silly monologue.”

 

“Oh, so you’re _not_ gonna tell us your great evil plan of conquering the world?”

 

“Of course not,” Veranke leaned forward and rested her elbows on the table, arm pressing against it, “I’ve got something so much more interesting to tell.”

 

“Please tell me it’s not your beauty secrets, because I gotta tell you,” Tony made a face, “you should fire your manicurist.”

 

“Oh, it’ll be fun breaking _you_ ,” Veranke grinned and looked him dead in the eye, “How about I tell you a story, Tony?”

 

Tony watched with a growing horror and freezing veins as Natasha morphed into a familiar figure. A figure that haunted his memories and burnt like yesterday’s touch. Bile churned in his gut but Tony couldn’t look away from the biggest nightmare of his life.

 

“After all, you did love my bedtime stories always,” Maria Stark spoke, her familiar smile turned evil and eyes devoid of any warmth Tony could imagine.

 

Maria leaned back in the chair and began her story.

 

“It all started with the Kree war in the middle of the 80s through the beginning of the 90s,” she said and Tony found himself slipping into a quagmire of memories from an alien view.

 

 _The_ _Kree had always been persistent but these humans, these agents, were worse. The queen threw the destroyed package of information into the fireplace and snarled low as she eyed the files on the table. Howard Stark, the name read. The main fighter of SHIELD, the man of science._

 

_“Are we sure about this, my Queen?” Chrell asked, gaze darting between Stark’s file and the door, clearly hearing for footsteps._

 

_“To win a battle,” the queen shifted, green giving way to pale human tone and black hair turning blonde, “one must win wars.”_

 

_“And to win wars,” Maria Stark spoke in the queen’s voice as she smiled down at Stark’s file, “we must first create them.”_

 

—-

_Getting swapped with the human woman was easy. Disposing off her body was easier. Dealing with Howard Stark was a little annoying._

_But it was the man’s son who caught the queen’s eye. Smart, capable, aching for attention, alone, always seeking an unseen affection. A child with too fast a brain. A weapon with too soft a heart._

_She smiled at him but kept her face sad. Touched his face but wore gloves and an empty pair of eyes. Played music but chose songs to taunt loneliness. Flinched visibly from a drunk Howard when the boy watched. Kissed a drink with bottomless lips and shied her eyes from the conflicted boy’s gaze. Loved him just enough. Pushed him more than enough._

_Became his mother. Made him a boy with everything and gave him nothing._

_She knew what would grow faster and watched._

—-

_She pretended to not hear her husband argue with Carter over a shadow similar to Hydra. Welcomed Obadiah home when she knew how he would poison Howard’s ears again. Her generals were already in the Hydra ranks, and she knew the weapon being trained there._

_She kissed Tony goodbye when he left to study abroad and nudged him Stane’s way when she told him that Howard wouldn’t be wishing him unfortunately. Stane was a fool but he was a good weapon for the end. He would make her job easier._

_No father survived the desertion of a son. No son survived the neglect of a father._

_She righted her hair and played the piano._

—–

_It was easy to play a mother when Tony never really knew one. The queen left Howard’s liquor cabinet open and watched Tony eye it with painful anger. It was easy to drink when she saw her son watch her in the mirror._

_Grief was always a good predecessor to ruins_.

—-

_“Is the weapon ready?” she asked in a party and the Skrull wearing the skin of the Secretary smiled as he answered._

 

_“Just as you planned, my queen.”_

 

_It was easy to let out Howard’s secret of the serum samples. Hydra was predictable as all humans, and her generals there pushed the idea along._

_It was smooth sailing. She danced with her ‘husband’ the night before their planned death._

_—–_

_The Winter Soldier was a good weapon but he was still a weapon. Every weapon had its secrets. His secret was his programming. He was good at his mission. She was good with hers._

_The Skrull in her stead had died bravely and Veranke felt a flicker of distaste at a lost resource. It had been easy to let a soldier take her person, to shift into the beloved Stark wife for one day, to die for a greater cause._

_In her new form, Veranke planned her next war. She had a Red Room of weapons to train_.

_She made sure that the footage of the Stark murder stayed alive._

—-

_Singling out the girl was easy. Natalia was crafty, still warm at heart, a killer’s hands. Veranke trained her personally even as she watched the girl to learn._

_Every body was a weapon._

—–

_It was easy to snap Natalia’s neck when the SHIELD agent wasn’t watching. He had a good sight but he was still blind to darkness._

_“Clint Barton,” he would introduce himself later, grinning lazily with a bandaged forehead._

_“Natasha Romanoff,” she replied, red hair tied up as white lies began falling._

_They could later blame her being a Communist. Humans created her way themselves and the queen let them build their roads._

—-

_Meeting Tony Stark again was amusing. She knew him better than Fury wanted her to know. She had raised him. She would destroy him._

_She rejected him when he needed acceptance and let him build his own pyre. Fury praised her. She almost pitied him._

—–

_Steve Rogers - Bruce Banner - Thor Odinson - they were all from broken families and forgotten loves. She gave them what they thought they needed. They would trust her. They would destroy their empire for hers._

—-

_Ultron knew her. He had to die. He had to be stopped._

_She pushed the beast off a cliff and fought for a world she would later rule._

—

_It was almost too easy by the end. Hearing Tony hit the nail almost with his DNA comment made her angry._

_He would pay later. She knew how to make her beloved son pay._

—-

Tony could feel himself shivering even as he knew Steve struggled against his restraints a few feet away.

 

“Why?” he asked even though he knew the answer. The futurist, his mind scoffed, the futurist who never saw the present. The genius who had never seen the trap.

 

“Because,” Veranke smiled in Maria’s form, now standing right before Tony, bending down to whisper against his ear, “you are my favourite chess piece, Tony. My beloved knight.”

 

He felt numb when she kissed his cheek before leaving the room to issue the command of worldwide destruction.

 

He felt dead when Bucky Barnes came to save them and untied him after Steve.

 

He felt nothing when the Winter Soldier killed the woman wearing his mother’s face this time.

 

They won the war and went home, Steve beside him this time instead of against, finally a friend instead of a legend. Tony lost his home and went to war, death beside him this time instead of life, finally a weapon.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm sorry? Comments please!


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